A Digital Infrastructure for Cardiovascular Patient Care Based on Mobile Health Data and Patient-Reported Outcomes: Concept Details of the Helios TeleWear Project Including Preliminary Experiences (Preprint)

Abstract

UNSTRUCTURED Mobile Health (mHealth) approaches are already having a fundamental impact on clinical practice in cardiovascular medicine. A variety of different health applications and wearable devices for capturing health data such as electrocardiograms (ECG) exist. However, most mHealth technologies focus on distinct variables without integrating patients’ quality of life and the impact on clinical outcome measures of implementing those digital solutions into cardiovascular health care are still to be determined. Within this document, we describe the TeleWear project, which was recently initiated as an approach for contemporary patient management integrating mobile collected health data and the standardized mHealth-guided measuring of patient-reported outcomes (PROs) in patients with cardiovascular disease. The specifically designed mobile application and clinical frontend form the central elements of our TeleWear infrastructure. The platform allows far-reaching customization with the possibility to add different mHealth data sources and respective questionnaires. With initial focus on patients with cardiac arrhythmias, a feasibility study is currently carried out to assess wearable-recorded ECG and PRO transmission and its evaluation by physicians utilizing the TeleWear application and clinical frontend. A randomized controlled trial including atrial fibrillation patients which investigates PRO- and ECG-based clinical management based on the established TeleWear infrastructure will be the next step towards the establishment of a comprehensive telemedical center entrenched by mHealth.